sustainability Article Evaluating Institutional Dichotomy between Urban and Rural Land Administration in Amhara Region, Ethiopia Worku Nega 1,* , Mulugeta Tenaw 1 , Yeneneh Hunie 1 , Sayeh Kassaw Agegnehu 1 and Reinfried Mansberger 2 1 Institute of Land Administration, Debre Markos University, Debre Markos 269, Ethiopia; [email protected] (M.T.); [email protected] (Y.H.); [email protected] (S.K.A.) 2 Institute of Geomatics, University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences, A-1190 Vienna, Austria; [email protected] * Correspondence: [email protected] Abstract: Institutional setup in the land administration system plays a crucial role in the successful functioning of modern land administration. The institutional setup, whether separated for urban and rural land administration or unified, is responsible for implementing the legal and policy framework. In most regions of Ethiopia, including the Amhara National Regional State, the institutional setup is separated, which results in increasing difficulties to administer land efficiently. The purpose of this study was to assess the challenges and opportunities of the institutional dichotomy between urban and rural land administration in the Amhara region. Primary and secondary data were used in the study. Questionnaires, focus group discussions (FGDs) and interviews with key informants were applied to collect the data. As the findings of the study revealed, about 55% of the respondents agreed that the integration between urban and rural land administration institutions is weak. In addition, 38% of the respondents also confirmed that the integration between the two independent Citation: Nega, W.; Tenaw, M.; Hunie, Y.; Agegnehu, S.K.; institutions is very weak. The institutional separation between urban and rural land has opened Mansberger, R. Evaluating the door for land invasion and informal settlement in peri-urban areas. The study also identifies Institutional Dichotomy between overlapping job titles, wastage of human and material resources, and promulgation of contradicting Urban and Rural Land urban and rural land laws as the challenges in the region due to the dichotomy of land administration Administration in Amhara Region, between urban and rural. Although administering urban and rural land in separate institutions helps Ethiopia. Sustainability 2021, 13, 9431. for minimizing the workload, the findings tend to administer land in a unified institution and within https://doi.org/10.3390/su13169431 an independent ministry. Academic Editor: Maria Rosa Trovato Keywords: institutional separation; institutional structure; land administration institutions; strength; weakness; unified institution Received: 20 July 2021 Accepted: 13 August 2021 Published: 23 August 2021 1. Introduction Publisher’s Note: MDPI stays neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in Traditionally, land administration institutions were established to compile land records published maps and institutional affil- that could be used to collect land taxes [1]. One key factor for the effectiveness of a land iations. administration system (LAS) is the institutional setting of land [2,3]. Institutions of land administration play a crucial role in putting the legal and policy framework into action [2,4]. Institutional frameworks are not static since they change through time to better facilitate the implementation of LAS and good governance [2,5]. The institutional frameworks of land administration differ between countries around the world and often reflect local, Copyright: © 2021 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. cultural and judicial settings [6–9]. In most countries, the institutional arrangement of land This article is an open access article administration depends on the local context and the legal framework or the land policy of distributed under the terms and the country [10]. For instance, China has a dual system of land administration. In China, conditions of the Creative Commons urban land is owned by the state while rural and peri-urban land are collectively owned Attribution (CC BY) license (https:// by the local community [11,12]. However, the dual institutional arrangement of land has creativecommons.org/licenses/by/ created challenges to transfer land rights. Specifically, rights to use state-owned land can 4.0/). be commercialized, while rights to collectively owned land cannot be sold to anyone as Sustainability 2021, 13, 9431. https://doi.org/10.3390/su13169431 https://www.mdpi.com/journal/sustainability Sustainability 2021, 13, 9431 2 of 19 a commodity [13]. Accordingly, the dual urban–rural land administration institutional arrangement in China has resulted in significant disparities in income, social welfare and public services between urban and rural residents [14]. In addition, compared with urban areas, rural areas lack investment, infrastructure and economic reforms, which have limited rural economic development and widened the gap between urban and rural development [15]. The dual urban and rural land tenure system has significantly limited the integration of economic and social development in China [14]. In general, the dual urban–rural land administration system in China leads to a differ- ent land rights system, an inefficient use of land resources, a rapid conversion of arable land, limited farmers’ land rights, land disputes between the two institutions, distorted land markets and social disintegration [15–19]. In Nigeria, the national government is responsible for administering land within an urban area only, while the local government is empowered to administer land outside urban area. The dichotomy of land administra- tion between urban and rural land administration institutions has resulted in problems such as issuance of inappropriate certificate, confused land identification processes and administrative conflicts between the national government and the local government in the country. Unsuitably, there is no clear demarcation of powers and responsibilities of these bodies. Scholars have recommended that there should be no dichotomy between urban and rural land administration and there must be a uniform system in the management of land in Nigeria [10]. In Ethiopia, two separated institutions are responsible for the management of land. Rural land is administered by the Ministry of Agriculture, while urban land is administered by the Ministry of Urban Development and Construction at the federal level. The corre- sponding regional Bureaus of the two federal ministries are responsible for the urban and rural land administrations separately at the regional levels in most regions of the country. Strengthening Ethiopian land administration system requires a deep understanding of the country’s historical, legal and institutional context, as well as contemporary practices [20]. There must be a strong institutional arrangement in both urban and rural land to carry out the land administration functions, as well as to build up sustainable land administration capacity in Ethiopia in general and in Amhara region in particular [2,4,21]. The institutional setup is one of the most crucial aspects that influences the success of land administration systems [2]. Land administration institutions at all levels are key role players in putting the legal and regulatory frameworks into practice [6,22]. A strong co-ordination among service-providing land administration institutions is another key factor for determining the quality of the land administration service delivery for long-term development [23]. The weakest part of Ethiopian land administration institution setup is the institutional dichotomy between urban and rural land [2,9]. Separating institutions into urban and rural land is not based on land administration core processes and key functions in Ethiopia [2]. Scholars argue that most of the land related problems Ethiopia faced are due to the separation of land administration institutions [2,24]. It causes a mismatch of institutional responsibilities, increases the cost of land administration services delivery, lowers the qual- ity of services, complicates co-ordination between separate institutions, makes it difficult to develop common standards for land administration systems and jeopardizes tenure security by causing land records to be neglected [4,20,24,25]. Furthermore, institutional separation for urban and rural land leads to inconsistent implementation of land policies on urban and rural land rights and it increases land wastage and illegal occupations, partic- ularly on the outskirts of cities [2,3,26]. Above all, the absence of a strong central national institution that gives clear policy, legal, technical and financial guidance for both urban and rural land in an integrated approach has resulted in uncertainty in the country as well as in the region [24]. In addition, some studies such as [2,3,24,27] have tried to indicate the challenges of institutional separation between urban and rural land administration. The above all studies reported indirectly the problem of institutional separation of urban and rural land administration in Ethiopia. However, none of the studies has been con- ducted with clear set objectives and methods to identify the challenges of institutional Sustainability 2021, 13, 9431 3 of 19 separation between urban and rural land administration. In addition, the opportunities of institutional separation between urban and rural land administration were not thoroughly addressed by these studies. Accordingly, there is a dearth of studies